WO2009045124A1

WO2009045124A1 - Method for removing tattoos and scars

Info

Publication number: WO2009045124A1
Application number: PCT/RU2008/000492
Authority: WO
Inventors: Konstantin Stanislavovich Avramenko
Original assignee: Avramenko Konstantin Stanislav
Priority date: 2007-10-02
Filing date: 2008-07-28
Publication date: 2009-04-09
Also published as: US20100249768A1; UA97299C2; CA2701873C; CA2701873A1; RU2007136276A; EP2201904A1; EP2201904A4; RU2366469C2

Abstract

The invention relates to medicine and can be used for removing tattoos, scars, keloid and wound cicatrices. The inventive method consists in acting on the epidermal layer with an alternating electric field in such a way that high-frequency discharges are formed between the epidermal layer and a needle electrode. Said method makes it possible to effectively removing tattoos of different colours and scars of different nature. The removal is carried out during a minimum time and does not bring about any complications, since the skin areas with defects to be removed are not exposed to excessive thermal action

Description

The method of removing tattoos or scars

The invention relates to medicine and can be used in the practice of removing tattoos, scars, as well as 5 keloid and wound scars.

A tattoo is a collection of small, from 0.1 mm to 4-5 mm or more in depth punctures or cuts on the skin of a person into which any dye is applied.

The human body, protecting itself from being injected through punctures

[O (incisions) in the skin of a foreign substance, a dye, begins to build around each particle of the dye substance that has fallen into the skin, protective capsules from cells of connective tissue. These capsules are fully formed 3-7 days after the dye is introduced into the human skin through punctures

15 (cuts).

Because of these protective capsules, which do not allow the dye particles to penetrate deeper into the body, the tattoo is an extremely stable structure that is difficult to remove.

There are several ways to remove a tattoo. ZO 1. Mechanical, by the method of plastic surgery, removal of a piece of skin with a tattoo, followed by tightening and suturing of the edges of the resulting wound, or, if the removed piece of skin with a tattoo is large, with a piece of clean skin transplanted from another part of the patient’s body or 5 from the donor.

2. Etching, burning a piece of skin with a tattoo using various acids or alkalis. 3. Mechanical removal of a piece of skin with a tattoo using a cutter with the Dermatom device.

4. Burning a piece of skin with a tattoo with any heated object. 5. Burning, evaporation of a piece of skin with a tattoo using a CO ₂ laser.

6. Consistent, in several sessions, the impact on the dye particles of the tattoo located inside the patient’s skin with the help of laser radiation from erbium, neodymium, ruby, Q-switsh, etc. lasers. In this case, the laser radiation does not damage the surface of the patient’s skin, but passes through the skin and heats the darker particles of the tattoo dye already inside the skin.

There are also the following methods to remove scars. 1. Surgical removal of the scar - all at once or with a small tape, 2-3 cm wide and no more than 6-9 cm long, with subsequent hemming of the edges of the resulting incision. Healthy skin stretches and covers a piece of cut scar. This should also include a skin transplant from the patient’s body or the donor. This occurs at the site of the excised scar.

2. Laser resurfacing of the scar. Similar to numerous erbium laser tattoo removal sessions. Each time, the upper layer of the scar is evaporated by a laser no more than 0.1 - 0.3 mm. At the same time, the scar itself becomes flatter by exactly this amount.

3. The use of injections of various biologically active substances that “loosen” a little and flatten the scar. Similar methods for removing tattoos or scars are also disclosed in the patent literature (see RU20921 19, RU2247554 RU2044552).

The disadvantages of the cited technical solutions include the fact that all these methods never allow you to get rid of the scar completely, but only slightly reduce the bulge and hardness of the scar or thermally damage the skin when the tattoo is reduced, which leads to the appearance of scars.

When used to burn such holes with the evaporation of skin particles with the dye of CO ₂ laser tattoos, heat is distributed from the laser radiation to the underlying tissues at a distance of 3-5 depths of the burned hole into the underlying and underlying tissues. In this case, complete thermal damage and destruction of the underlying and underlying tissues occurs at distances of 3-5 depths of the burned hole, both in depth and from the sides of the hole.

During healing, this subsequently causes the replacement of thermally destroyed tissues with connective scar tissue during healing, which leads to the formation of non-aesthetic-looking scars and scars at the site of the removed tattoo.

Compared to laser tattoo removal, it should be noted that when using erbium, neodymium, ruby, Q-Switсh, etc. lasers, it is necessary to conduct a large number of treatment sessions for the patient’s skin with a laser tattoo - at least 5 sessions, usually from 10 to 30 sessions. The time interval between sessions is at least 3 weeks. Accordingly, the removal time tattoos, if necessary, say, conducting 10 sessions, stretches for at least 6-8 months. Sometimes up to 2-3 years.

When applying this technique, the removal of a tattoo of a small area occurs 1 time. After 2-3 weeks, after the healing of the holes, the tattoo is already absent.

Another negative feature of the application of the laser method is the complete impossibility of removing these red ink tattoo method. This is because the wavelengths of the lasers are selected in such a way as not to destroy, when penetrating deep into the skin, to the dye particles of the tattoo, red blood cells in the skin capillaries. Red blood cells are predominantly red due to hemoglobin. Accordingly, the effects on the dye of red, orange are simply not occurring, the effect on the dye of yellow is extremely small.

Therefore, when using the lasers of the above types to remove tattoos made with orange and yellow dyes, an even greater number, up to 40-50, of sessions is required. And the removal of tattoos made with red dyes is simply not possible.

The technical result of the invention is the provision of the removal of skin defects without damaging the underlying or underlying tissues and without the formation of scars or scars. The technical result is achieved by the fact that in the method of removing skin defects in the form of tattoos and scars, which consists in burning defective areas of the epidermal layer by exposure to it using a source of highly concentrated energy, in accordance with the invention, the effect is carried out by an alternating electric field with the occurrence of RF discharges between the epidermal layer and the needle electrode. It is advisable that the distance between the electrode and the epidermal layer is from 0.01 to 20 mm, and the most desirable is the distance between the electrode and the epidermal layer from 0.5 to 4.5 mm.

The number of discharges per second during exposure can reach from 1 to 1,000,000.

It is advisable to burn sections of the epidermal layer, the diameter of which does not exceed 10 mm, evenly distributed over the area of the defect, after healing, repeat burning in the specified manner of the remaining sections of the defect, repeat these steps until the defect is completely burned over its entire area.

In addition, it is desirable that, before exposure to the epidermal layer, it is pre-cooled by 5-50 ^° C. The RF discharge voltage is from 20 to 10,000 V.

The invention consists in the following.

The proposed method for removing tattoos and scars is that to remove the defective pieces of skin using an RF voltage source with one needle electrode. For example, such a source may be the device described in RF patent N ° 2191113, in which the needle electrode protrudes beyond the edges of the nozzle opening. In this case, the operation mode of the device without gas supply is used. On The needle electrode creates an alternating quasistatic electric field. The operator brings the needle electrode of the radiating head closer to the removed area of the skin with a tattoo at a distance of 0.01 mm to 20 mm. When the density of quasistatic charges is achieved on the needle electrode, which is sufficient for electric breakdown of the distance from the patient’s skin to the tip of the needle electrode, a quasistatic discharge occurs.

Such discharges occur from 1 to 1.000.000 per second, depending on the electric power supplied to the radiating head and on the distance from the tip of the needle electrode to the skin of the patient.

In this case, the tip of the needle electrode and the plane of the skin of the patient create a system similar to a vacuum diode. When a positive half-wave of an alternating quasistatic electric field passes, a breakdown occurs from the tip of the needle electrode, which is an analog of the anode in a vacuum diode, to the patient's skin.

With the passage of the negative half-wave of an alternating quasistatic electric field at the tip of the needle electrode, breakdown from the patient’s skin to the needle electrode does not occur. There is the effect of rectification of an alternating quasistatic electric field.

Each single electrical discharge from a needle electrode onto the patient’s skin burns a microscopic hole in the patient’s skin, vaporizing, burning off all the organics at the point of contact, both skin cells and particles of any tattoo dye. However, because such discharges occur up to 1.000.000 per second, the total effect of this combination of discharges creates a clearly visible hole in the patient’s skin, with a depth of 0.1 to 5-6 mm. But since such a total well consists of a huge number of microwells, thermal damage does not extend into the depth of the skin, along the edges of the total well.

In the case of applying an RF discharge to remove tattoos using a needle electrode, energy does not spread deep into the tissue from the resulting well. The amount of thermal damage to surrounding tissues is not more than 0.3 mm (usually 0.05 - 0.1 mm)

Accordingly, there is no replacement of damaged tissues, as is the case with a CO ₂ laser, connective tissue, and no scars or scars occur. It should be noted another physical feature of the use of this device.

Electric discharges from the tip of the needle electrode to the patient's skin are quasistatic in nature, i.e. completely analogous to static electric discharge. It is known that static electricity can propagate only on the surface of a conductor or semiconductor, without penetrating deep into. Accordingly, when treating the patient’s skin with such quasistatic discharges, the discharges, due to their nature, cannot penetrate deep into the patient’s skin and cause any damage to underlying and adjacent tissues.

Therefore, the cosmetic effect of the application of the proposed method when removing tattoos and scars, It turns out to be incomparably better than when using all the above methods to remove tattoos and scars.

There are no scars when removing tattoos using an RF discharge at all. During the healing of the holes, the patient’s body regenerates new clean skin with the restored structure of the papillary lines in the place of the hole. Also, over time, a complete restoration of the hairline occurs. To remove tattoos in accordance with the proposed method, the color and chemical composition of the dye of the tattoo does not matter.

Particularly good results were obtained when removing tattoos and scars by the proposed method, not in solid areas, but in small areas of no more than 2 square meters. see. Typically, the diameter of the deleted area is 4-5 mm, but not more than 10 mm. Such areas are distributed evenly throughout the entire defect space, for example, in a checkerboard pattern. After healing of the removed areas (after 1-2 weeks), the areas on the remaining part of the tattoo or scar are similarly removed, and so on until the defect is completely removed over the entire area.

In this case, several positive results are achieved at once.

1. In the case of mechanical damage from accidental external influences, only 1-3 small holes are damaged, and not the entire area if the tattoos are removed in large sections. 2. In the event of infection during postoperative care, one or several removed small areas are driven out, and not the entire area of one area as if removed by large areas. 3. Unprocessed skin patches between the removed patches give elasticity to the entire structure, while when removing the tattoo in large areas, the formation of one continuous crust occurs, which can burst when the patient’s subcutaneous muscles tension, an extremely uncomfortable feeling of constriction is observed for the patient skin, limitation of mobility at the place of removal

4. The healing processes of small remote areas are much faster than when removing skin with a tattoo in one area of a large area. A particularly positive cosmetic effect is obtained if, before starting the removal of tattoos or scars, in accordance with the proposed method, lower the temperature of the treated area of the skin in any way by at least 10-20 or more degrees Celsius. More than 300 patients were treated to optimize the operation of the device when removing tattoos.

First of all, studies were conducted on the dependence of the quality of tattoo removal on the frequency of the converter of the device used. The frequency of operation of the high-voltage resonant transformer used in the device changed.

Data were obtained, in 73 cases of using the device, that the change in the frequency of the electronic a converter supplying a resonant transformer, in the range from 1000 Hz to 1.000.000 Hz, does not have any noticeable effect on the quality of tattoo removal.

However, when applying higher frequencies, the dimensions and cost of the resonant transformer are reduced.

Therefore, from the point of view of reducing the cost of the device, it is nevertheless optimal to work at frequencies of more than 50,000 Hz.

Studies have also been carried out on the effect of the voltage of the RF discharge created by the device used.

127 experiments were conducted.

At the same time, results were obtained showing that with a voltage between the needle electrode and the patient's skin more than 10,000 V, skin burns are possible with subsequent scarring.

Studies have also been conducted to optimize the distance from the needle electrode to the skin of the patient (239 experiments).

Data were obtained that the optimal distance is not more than 4-5 mm from the needle electrode to the skin of the patient. With an increase in the distance from 5 mm to 20 mm, an “electrospray” of the electrostatic discharge was observed. It became difficult to get into the selected area of the tattoo, the total area of exposure increased, which led to unnecessary treatment of the surrounding areas of the clean skin areas.

With an increase in the distance between the needle electrode and the patient’s skin by more than 20 mm, electric power, necessary for an electrical breakdown of such a distance was so large that in 100% of cases it caused burns with subsequent formation of scars and scars (17 experiments were conducted). Thus, it is obvious that the optimal distance between the needle electrode and the patient’s skin is from 0.01 mm to 5 mm. Maximum permissible distance - no more than 20

MM

47 experiments were conducted to remove scars and scars of various etiologies for patients.

In 34 cases, extremely positive cosmetic results were obtained - the scars completely disappeared.

In 7 cases, there was a slight smoothing of the treated scar.

In 6 cases, no changes occurred.

Thus, as follows from the materials presented, the proposed method for removing tattoos and scars allows you to effectively remove tattoos of different colors and scars of various nature. Removal is carried out in the shortest possible time and does not lead to complications, since areas of the skin with removable defects are not exposed to excessive thermal stress.

Claims

CLAIM

1. The method of removing skin defects in the form of tattoos and scars, which consists in burning out defective sections of the epidermal layer by exposing them to it with a highly concentrated energy source, characterized in that the exposure is carried out by an alternating electric field with the appearance of RF discharges between the epidermal layer and the needle electrode.

2. The method according to p. 1, characterized in that the distance between the electrode and the epidermal layer is from 0.01 to 20 mm

3. The method according to claim 1, wherein the discharge voltage is from 20 to 10,000 V.

4. The method according to p. 1, characterized in that the effect is carried out with the occurrence of from 1 to 1000 000 bits per second.

5. The method according to p. 1, characterized in that they burn sections of the epidermal layer, the diameter of which does not exceed 10 mm, uniformly distributed over the area of the defect, after healing, repeat the burning of the remaining sections of the defect in this way, these steps are repeated until the defect is completely burned over its area.

6. The method according to p. 1, characterized in that prior to exposure, the epidermal layer is pre-cooled by 5-50 ^° C.